# Date: 1918-01

LENINIST MISCELLANY

"If a revolutionary war were to break out, we (that is, our government) would be overthrown—that's clear as day."

We will not give grain. But the German is no fool and will force us to give grain.

Arguments of supporters of "revolutionary war":

| "Not an immediate revolutionary war"
| "The German soldier will not go to capitulation".... ("I believe in these fairy tales")
/ "Dictatorship of the peasantry," "peasant, petty-bourgeois, muzhik mir"
| [same reasoning as the advocates of defense]
/ "Gradualism"
/ A step "to the right," with the rightists...
| "A state of civil war with Germany"
| "A state of revolution against German imperialism"
|| "I stand on Lenin's old position" (Obolenskii)

/ "Disintegrate the German and Austrian army—that is our form of struggle"....
/ "The ideology of an exhausted soldier"...
The technique does not decide

| ...both in domestic and in revolution-
[revolutionary war.]
| "Revolution, which is not in a position to defend itself on the front, has already perished"...
|| ...Example of the great French revolution"....
/ "Conciliating with German imperialism".......

"Cambrai" (Cambrai—a city in France, near which in the winter of 1917–1918 the Germans achieved a major victory over the French. At that time, some newspapers published articles arguing that the success of the German army at Cambrai was explained by the fact that the peace negotiations at Brest liberated the hands of the Germans against the French.

* The discussion concerns negotiations between Lenin and Trotsky, on the one hand, and the representative of the United States of North America, Colonel Robins, and the representative of France, J. Sadoul, on the other, regarding the possible use by Soviet Russia of military-technical aid from the Allies for defense against German offensive. The "Left Communists" considered such "conciliation" with imperialists inadmissible. A detailed analysis of their arguments was later given by Lenin in the article "On the Itch" (Collected Works, vol. XXII, pp. 272–274 and note 119, pp. 607–608).

NOTES ON THE PARTY MEETING

* These refer to Lenin's repeated declarations in 1915–1917 that after coming to power the Bolsheviks would "prepare and conduct a revolutionary war" against imperialists (see document 16, note 1, p. 38). Lenin's analysis of this argument is given in point 12 of the "Theses on the Question of the Immediate Conclusion of a Separate and Annexationist Peace." (Collected Works, vol. XXII, p. 196.)

* L. D. Trotsky had in mind the negotiations between representatives of the petty-bourgeois Ukrainian Rada and the Germans at Brest and, in particular, the recognition by the German delegation of the autonomy of the peace delegation of the Ukrainian Rada at Brest on January 12, 1918, new style. The meaning of Trotsky's argumentation appears to be that the signing of a peace treaty with the Germans would force Soviet Russia to refuse aid to the insurgent movement against the Rada in Ukraine and would arrest the successful offensive of Soviet troops against Kaledin in the southeast and against the Rada in Ukraine that was developing at that time.

* It is likely that reference is made to Lenin's use in the "Theses" of a statement from the German left independent newspaper "Leipziger Volkszeitung" about the necessity for Soviet Russia to "hold out as long as possible." (Collected Works, vol. XXII, p. 196 and note 89, p. 600.)

* This refers to the demand presented by the Germans on January 15(2) and January 18(5) for the "retention on strategic grounds" of their troops throughout Poland, Lithuania, most of Latvia and Byelorussia—that is, essentially their annexation.

The document below, in the manuscript, has three asterisks instead of a title, which indicates that it is a continuation of some other document. The manuscript is incomplete. The beginning of the manuscript: "The theses presented above..." suggests that it represents an afterword to the "Theses on the Question of the Immediate Conclusion of a Separate and Annexationist Peace" (Collected Works, vol. XXII, pp. 493–499), apparently intended for publication simultaneously with the theses. As is known, the theses were first published only on February 24, 1948 ("Pravda" No. 34) after the Central Committee on February 23 had accepted Lenin's proposal for the immediate conclusion of peace with Germany. Lenin accompanied them with a newly written introductory note "On the History of the Question of the Unfortunate Peace" (Collected Works, vol. XXII, p. 289). This "Afterword" remained unpublished. It was written, apparently, shortly after the party meeting of January 24(8), but no later than January 24(11), before the Central Committee's decision to prolong the peace negotiations.

* AFTERWORD

TO THE THESES ON THE QUESTION OF THE IMMEDIATE 
CONCLUSION OF A SEPARATE AND ANNEXATIONIST PEACE.

[January 21(8) – January 24(11), 1918]

The theses presented above were read by me before a small private meeting of party workers on January 8, 1918. The discussion of them revealed three opinions in the party on this question: [more than] approximately half of the participants spoke in favor of revolutionary war (this point of view was sometimes called the "Moscow" position, since the Moscow regional bureau of our party was the first organization to adopt it)*; then approximately a quarter supported Comrade Trotsky, who proposed to "declare the state of war terminated, demobilize the army and send it home, but not sign peace," and, finally, approximately a quarter supported me.

The situation that has developed in the party extraordinarily reminds me of the situation in the summer of 1907, when an enormous majority of Bolsheviks favored a boycott of the Third Duma, when I defended participation in it, alongside Dan, and was subjected to the fiercest attacks for this opportunism*. Objectively, the question now stands, equally, in complete analogy: just as then, the majority of party workers, proceeding from the very best revolutionary motives and the best party traditions, allow themselves to be carried away by a "brilliant" slogan, without grasping the new socio-economic and political situation, without taking into account the change in conditions, which requires rapid, sharp changes in tactics. And my entire dispute, as then, must be concentrated on clarifying that Marxism requires an accounting of objective conditions and their change, that the question must be posed concretely, in application to these conditions, that the fundamental transformation now consists in the creation of a Soviet republic of Russia, that the preservation of this republic, which has already begun the socialist revolution, is supreme for us and from the international-socialist point of view as well, that at this moment the slogan of revolutionary war on the part of Russia would mean either a phrase and mere demonstration or would objectively amount to falling into a trap laid for us by the imperialists, who wish to draw us into the continuation of the imperialist war as a still-weak partial force, and to smash the young Soviet republic as cheaply as possible.

"I stand on Lenin's old position"—exclaimed one of the young Muscovites (youth is one of the greatest virtues distinguishing this group of speakers)3. And the same speaker reproached me for the fact that I supposedly repeat the old arguments of the defensists about the improbability of revolution in Germany.

Therein lies the problem: the Muscovites wish to stand on the old tactical position, stubbornly refusing to see how it has changed, how a new objective position has been created.

The Muscovites did not even take into account, in their eagerness to repeat the old slogans, that we, the Bolsheviks, have all now become defensists. For, having overthrown the bourgeoisie, having torn up and exposed the secret treaties, having proposed genuine peace to all peoples*

1 Lenin has in mind the resolution of the plenum of the Moscow regional bureau of the R.S.-D.R.P. (b.) on the current situation of January 10, 1918 (December 28, 1917), which demanded "the cessation of peace negotiations with the imperialists of Germany, as well as the breaking of all diplomatic relations with all diplomaed robbers of all countries" (see "Sotsial-Demokrat" No. 7, January 25(12), 1918). The resolution was drafted on behalf of the plenum by a narrow group of the bureau (G. I. Lomov, Mantsev, Kizelshtein, Maksimovskii, Yanyshev, Ginzburg, I. N. Stukov). At the plenum only G. I. Lomov's theses on his report were adopted. (On the composition of the Moscow regional bureau of the party, see Collected Works, vol. XXII, note 128, p. 609.)

3 Lenin has in mind his position on the question of participation in elections to the Third State Duma. Despite the fact that by the decree of June 3, 1907, the voting rights of workers and peasants were severely curtailed, Lenin insisted on participation in the Duma, considering it necessary to utilize the Duma tribune as one of the few legal opportunities. To discuss the question of the attitude of the S.D. party to the elections, in July 1907 in Finland the Second All-Russian Conference of the R.S.-D.R.P. was convened, at which Lenin, at the head of a part of the Bolsheviks, relying on Menshevik votes, carried through a resolution on participation in the election campaign and in the State Duma contrary to the insistence of the left wing of the Bolsheviks on a boycott of the Duma.

* From the speech of V. V. Obolenskii at the party meeting of January 21(8), 1918 (see document 17, p. 41).

[At this point the manuscript breaks off. Ed.]